• The Redskins are billing Sunday night’s game against the Indianapolis Colts as their “first annual homecoming game.” It also will be alumni weekend, and the Redskins will present former Hog Russ Grimm his Hall of Fame ring. Grimm was enshrined in Canton last summer. Grimm is an assistant head coach of the Arizona Cardinals, who have a bye this week. Fifty former Redskins, including Sonny Jurgensen, Doug Williams, Pat Fischer, Larry Brown, Sam Huff, Deacon Jones and Joe Jacoby are expected to attend the festivities. “High schools and colleges have homecomings,” Redskins GM Bruce Allen said. “Why can’t we?”

• Attention D-FW sports fans: The city of Cincinnati feels your pain. The Queen City staged a downtown doubleheader of its own last Sunday with the NFL Bengals and baseball’s Reds playing games at adjacent stadiums. Like the Arlington Cowboys and Rangers last Sunday, both home teams lost. The Reds were swept out of the National League playoffs by the Phillies, and the Bengals blew a 10-point lead in the final 81 seconds in losing to Tampa Bay.

Rising stock

Kareem Moore, S, Washington: The Washington Redskins haven’t forced many turnovers of late, ranking in the bottom quarter of the league in takeaways in each of the last four seasons. They finished 32nd in 2009 (17) and 2006 (12), 28th in 2007 (24) and 25th in 2008 (25).

If you can’t force turnovers, you can’t get opposing offenses off the field and you can’t win games. The Redskins went 26-38 during that four-year stretch. Moore was a sixth-round draft pick in 2008 from Nicholls State who took two years to adjust to the higher level of competition and speed of the NFL game. Then he missed the first two games of the 2010 season with a lingering knee injury from training camp.

But since hitting the field as the starting free safety, Moore has been a driving force in Washington’s 3-2 start that places the Redskins atop the NFC East. Moore has come up with a takeaway in each of the three games he has played – thus becoming the first Redskin since Pro Bowl safety Sean Taylor in 2007 to come away with turnovers in three consecutive games.

Moore intercepted a pass against St. Louis and then recovered a fumble each of the last two weeks in upset victories over Philadelphia and Green Bay.

A third-round draft pick, Dockery started from the fourth game of his rookie season in 2003 at left guard. But Shanahan prefers smaller, more mobile blockers in his zone-blocking scheme. At 6-6, 325 pounds, Dockery is more of a road grader. So Shanahan benched Dockery for Kory Lichtensteiger in the third game against St. Louis, ending his consecutive-start streak at 111.

Two games later, Shanahan made Dockery a game-day inactive for the first time in his career. The trade deadline is Oct. 19. Dockery could be changing teams by then.

It’s what’s up front that counts: Speaking of offensive linemen, here are a few tidbits:

Around the Ranch

Once upon a time, Brett Favre could not beat the Cowboys. He lost his first seven starts against them, including three in the playoffs, and finished the 1990s decade 1-8 against Dallas. But he was competing against a Hall of Fame set of Triplets then. That’s no longer the case. So Favre won twice as many games against the Cowboys in the 2000 decade – posting a 2-1 record with victories as the starting quarterback of the Packers (2004) and Vikings (2009). A victory over the Cowboys on Sunday would give Favre his first-ever winning streak against the Cowboys – two games.

Final thought

There’s a school of thought that there’s no such thing as a “must” game in the NFL in October. There’s too much time left in the season for any game to be labeled a must win. But trust me – the Cowboys-Vikings game Sunday is a “must” game … for both teams.

These two teams carried Super Bowl expectations into the season, yet both find themselves 1-3. No team has ever started 1-4 and advanced to win a Super Bowl. Only two teams with 2-3 starts have hoisted the Lombardi Trophy – the 2001 Patriots and 1980 Raiders.